


Cenotaph

by 779H41, TetrodotoxinB



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Doctor Who, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Art degree Steve, Captain America Reverse Big Bang 2019, Doctor Who and Captain America crossover, Finally Steve trying to self-actualize, Gen, Just lots of creep, No graphic character death, Weeping Angels - Freeform, creepiness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-19
Updated: 2019-06-19
Packaged: 2020-05-14 12:23:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19273231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/779H41/pseuds/779H41, https://archiveofourown.org/users/TetrodotoxinB/pseuds/TetrodotoxinB
Summary: When Steve comes out of the ice, he discovers the GI bill and quickly makes use of it. Armed with a degree in art and one helluva desire to be something other than a government weapon, Steve gets an internship restoring art. But what starts as the path to achieving his dreams quickly turns into a nightmare that Steve never could have imagined.





	Cenotaph

**Author's Note:**

> Check out more of 779H41's fantastic art [here](https://bastgrr.tumblr.com/)!!!
> 
> Thanks to all my slack pals who endeavored to name this fic by committee but kept coming up with shit like "Teeth" which made no goddamn sense. (Although in fairness they did come up with "Cenotaph" so I can't really complain.)
> 
> Also, thanks to [ TheWriterOfPerfectDisasters](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewriterofperfectdisasters/pseuds/thewriterofperfectdisasters) and [SoftObsidian74](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SoftObsidian74/pseuds/SoftObsidian74) for screeching at me. And also SoftObsidian74 and [IreneADonovan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/IreneADonovan) for beta work.

Time was, Steve had spent a lot of time thinking about the future — going to science fairs, reading pulp magazines, listening in on some of Bucky’s engineering classes — but now that he’s in the future, Steve feels pretty underwhelmed. Mostly, it’s the stark lack of flying cars, but the therapist SHIELD makes him see says it’s just grief. Either way, the new flashy technology doesn’t do much to hold his attention.

So after SHIELD gets his back pay sorted and he gets himself all squared away with the GI bill, Steve does the one thing he never could in the past — art school. The history classes are easy enough; he’s got an eidetic memory now, so there’s no real studying needed. But the labs are something different. There, he’s just like all the other grungy art kids. His art is far from perfect and his shirt has just as much paint on it as theirs. No one cares that he’s a walking weapon. He’s just Steve the art student. 

Steve still has to avenge for his full-time job which isn’t the worst thing in the world, and he ends up taking a lot of night classes to make up for the class time he loses. Still, he manages to finish his undergrad in four years. It’s gratifying in an entirely new way. He’s done something for himself for what may be the first time. Opening the envelope and pulling out his diploma, Steve mentally thanks Bucky for all the years he pushed Steve to keep doing art.

_Gotta do something you love, pal. Can’t just live for work._

It’s some of the best advice he’s ever gotten.

*****

As they climb the stairs to the Southeast Asia exhibit, Ms. Maxwell adjusts her glasses and the look on her face makes Steve temporarily flash back to Sister Irma, her ruler at the ready. “I see on your transcript that you minored in sculpture. Tell me a little about why you made that choice.” 

Steve shoves his hands in his pockets and sighs quietly. “Before the war, all I could afford was charcoal pencils and paper. I either learned from books or from listening in on art classes that I couldn’t afford. I painted a couple things, but I never once got the chance to sculpt anything; I was too poor to even set foot in an art studio. But sculpting, it’s physical, it’s art that I can use my whole body in. I couldn’t have done that before regardless of how much money I had.”

The woman raises her brow at him. “You do realize that this is a restoration internship, correct?”

“Yes, ma’am. You’ll see that I took some courses in art restoration as well. I’ve got a bit of a vested interest, you might say, in preserving the past.”

For the first time in the interview, the little woman smiles. “Yes, well, I think that probably makes sense. Let’s go walk down to the restoration rooms, you can see what we’ve got waiting in the wings.”

*****

It’s an unpaid internship and his first project. Steve didn’t expect anything grand and he’s not disappointed. According to the tag, the statue was reclaimed from a warehouse that the city foreclosed on and the museum gained ownership of it from there. No known artist or previous place of display. Basically, it’s a practice dummy. If Steve fucks up, it goes in the garbage, no harm done. 

He pries the lid off the crate with a flat bar and starts digging out the packing straw. The first thing he notices is a broken wing. It’s lying, packed in what looks like a whole roll of bubble wrap, alongside the rest of the statue. He hefts it out, gently placing it on a work table, before going back to the crate. As far as Steve can see, the rest of the statue — apparently an angel — is intact. 

That opinion changes once he gets the statue out. It’s missing most of its left arm, the appendage crudely broken off just a few inches below the shoulder. Unlike the wing, the damaged portion is not in the crate. 

Reserving judgment about the restoration potential of the piece, Steve carefully unwraps the bubble wrap that encases his project. The marble is pitted and stained from what looks like years of exposure to the elements. But what catches his attention isn’t the horrible state of the statue itself. It’s the face.

For a moment, Steve stares, frozen in place. The eyes, the cheek bones, the cut of its jaw — every line and contour is Bucky down to the gentle cleft of his chin and the single wrinkle between his eyes. 

Even after four and a half years in the future, Steve still sees little bits of Bucky everywhere. The barista at his favorite coffee shop has eyes that are the same blue as Bucky’s. The man who runs the shawarma shop jokingly calls Steve “pal” and “jerk,” albeit with an Egyptian accent. Other times it’s just a laugh on the street or the way someone moves when they’re walking through the subway station. But it’s never more than one thing, never _this._ Steve breathes through his nose, gathers the bubblewrap, and goes to find the dumpster. 

It’s easy to let himself forget his grief some days, but right now it feels just as fresh as the day Bucky fell. He sits out on the loading dock, popping a square of bubblewrap for a long while before going back inside to face the statue.

*****

“You know, you’d have been pissed if you’d seen how I brought down the plane,” Steve says. His voice seems loud, almost obnoxious in the basement workroom. “I don’t think I’d have done it that way if you hadn’t fallen.” 

It’s the first time he’s admitted as much to anyone, even if this particular person is a weathered, and largely worthless, statue that coincidentally looks just like Bucky. He rolls the cotton swab over the statue’s cheek until it’s gray with years of dirt. 

“Alright, I gotta go grab another box,” Steve says, tossing the q-tip in the trash. 

He rummages around, getting more swabs and mixing more distilled water with alcohol. When he turns around, he almost startles. The statue seems to be looking at him. Ubiquitous gazes aren’t something statues have and Steve knows he’s probably imagining things here, alone in this basement with a statue of his dead best friend. The best friend he failed to save. 

After a second, he shrugs it off. Maybe this week when he sees his SHIELD-mandated shrink, he’ll tell her about it. About how he’s talking to a fucking statue about shit he won’t even tell her just because someone managed to slap the right facial features together in a way that fucks with Steve’s head. Maybe he’ll tell her about the gnawing guilt and the way it’s bubbling up, making him see shit that isn’t there. Okay, maybe he won’t tell her that part… or the other parts, either. Something. He’ll figure it out.

*****

It takes three weeks to clean the whole statue. The eyes still seem to follow him whenever he moves, but Steve’s seen stranger things. In the end, he writes it off as a stress reaction. What he’s suddenly stressed about he doesn’t know, but giving it a name means he doesn’t have to think about it. To wonder. There were guys in the war that had similar shit happen. “Shell shock” was what they called it; now it’s PTSD. Either way, maybe things like this _do_ leave their mark on him; maybe it just takes longer to show up. He’ll probably bring it up with his therapist this week.

*****

“You know, you’re looking a whole lot better with all the pitting getting filled in,” Steve comments one day. And honestly, the statue really is. 

Steve’s feeling pretty good about his work, and the restoration supervisor had been impressed. Finally, Steve feels like he’s good for something more than just killing. Bucky was right — he has to have a reason to exist outside of work. It’s made him feel like he’s more than just alive; he’s _living._

Unfortunately, Steve feels like he’s not the only thing alive in this whole weird art-related existential epiphany. Problem is, there’s nothing concrete, nothing he can point to and say, “Hey, you there. Why do you seem less than inanimate?” or “Hey, how long have you been standing there?” All he knows is that he doesn’t feel alone in the restoration room anymore. 

In a way, he misses the emptiness of the room, not least because he’s so uneasy, but also because it was a constant; he didn’t have to pretend that feeling alone in a crowd was okay. He was alone in an empty room. His inability to get his social footing in the future doesn’t matter when he’s truly by himself. But as the days turn into weeks, the feeling of not-being-alone turns into the feeling of being watched. It’s a ridiculous feeling, he knows. Just as ridiculous as thinking that the statue is following him with its eyes. If anything is watching him, it’s his own guilt as he stares into Bucky’s face day after day under the halogen work lights. 

And maybe that really is it, maybe Steve’s discomfiture with his work is really his discomfiture with himself. Looking at Bucky for hours every day brings up a lot of memories Steve doesn’t know what to do with. But even that explanation doesn’t really sit right. 

There’s something there. Years of combat experience have taught him what that feeling means. He clears the room again and again, missing the steady, trustworthy presence of the Howling Commandos. But even with only his own eyes to rely on, Steve knows there’s nothing and no one there. He tries to ignore his growing unease.

*****

Carefully filling the cracks and pits in the statue (that Steve very carefully doesn’t refer to as “Bucky”) is cathartic. Repairing the statue feels like atoning to Bucky, _for_ Bucky, which is stupid because Bucky died in the Alps and fixing this doesn’t fix anything. Steve knows that. But it _feels_ good. And as he works, the popsicle sticks and tiny microspatula working the plaster into the defects — defects that definitely aren’t wounds — Steve gets to know every detail of the statue in a way that he didn’t while he was cleaning it. 

That means that when the statue’s eyes continue to move, Steve continues to notice. The feeling of being watched has intensified to the point that he’s used Tony’s tech to hack the CCTV feed from his laptop. There’s nothing and no one. 

He’s discreetly swept the basement for bugs or cameras that aren’t synced with the CCTV system. Nothing. 

That leaves the eyes. The eyes that definitely can’t be moving but are also indisputably following him around the room. 

As Steve mixes another batch of plaster, he resolves to at least do a google search. If nothing else, he’ll feel like an idiot by the end of it because the only answers he’ll find will be a Wikipedia article on bigfoot.

*****

It’s three in the morning and Steve has found a lot more information than he expected, and far more than he would have liked, on “weeping angels.” Apparently, their existence is a folktale that’s identical in nearly every single culture. Unfortunately, that level of similarity lends more credence to the story than he is strictly comfortable with. But on the other hand, _really?_ This is what he’s going with? He almost laughs at the absurdity of the possibility that he’s seriously considering this. 

Of course, it occurs to him that SHIELD would know something if these things are actually real. It _also_ occurs to him that a) if they aren’t real, these aren’t the kinds of questions that he ought to be asking if he ever wants to be discharged from his head shrink, and b) even if SHIELD does know, it doesn’t mean his therapist does. He could still end up benched. 

With a fair amount of frustrated resignation, he instead clicks around the internet, spending more than a few hours digging up whatever information he can. It isn’t much that isn’t included on Wikipedia. There’s very little info on broken angel statues and none whatsoever on restoring one, not that he can blame anyone for not wanting to undertake that particular project. So it’s safe to assume he’s in uncharted territory. 

Still, Steve might be old, but he’s not _old._ The internet is full of bullshit, some of it oddly cohesive and believable bullshit. No matter what he sees or reads, it’s hard to buy wholesale into this nonsense. By the time he closes his laptop it’s nearly six and the sun is just coming up. His final decision is that he’s going to reserve judgment until later. It’s basically ignoring the problem, in as much as potentially hallucinating a sentient statue is the problem, as opposed to say his budding psychosis. 

Fuck. Art was supposed to be therapeutic.

*****

Steve goes back to work. He’s lived through a lot but this — it’s just a statue. A statue that looks just like his dead best friend, which is admittedly weird, but he’s just imagining things. Steve doesn’t believe in ghosts any more than weeping angels. What Steve does believe in, at least in theory, is the need for time off, especially given that the only vacation he’s ever had was seventy years in an ice nap. What it boils down to is that he’s tired and he needs a break. Nothing more. 

Even self-aware about the current state of his mental health, it still takes a fair amount of self-motivation to drag himself back to the restoration room. But he’s determined to keep moving, despite everything, so Steve goes back to shape the plaster that he’s added. As expected, the eyes of the statue continue to “move,” though Steve never really sees them move. But this time, that’s not what’s got his heart thumping in his chest.

This time, it’s the mouth.

He cleaned the mouth a few weeks ago. Then, he patched the pits in and around it. He knows what the teeth look like. He remembers the curve of the lips, the way his- _its_ lips turned down into the smallest of frowns. 

Bucky wore that particular frown often. Poring over bills late at night, trying to figure out how to make ends meet when they didn’t have enough for one of them, much less two. Trying to plot out a safe path through enemy terrain. Sewing up Steve just one more time after he took a round for one of the guys. It’s an expression etched into Steve’s memory. 

That frown — at least on the statue, though not in Steve’s memory — is gone. The teeth are longer now, more pointed and vicious. The lips are turned up and pulled back, like a dog baring its teeth. A smile that’s more threat than pleasure. 

Steve steps back bit by bit, slowly retreating in a way he’s never done before. Instinctively, he knows that he can’t win against this thing if it finally gets strong enough to do what it so clearly wants. 

He bumps into the workbench, blindly dropping his tray of plaster on the tabletop. 

“Steve!”

He whirls, taking his eyes off the statue and knocking a tray of popsicle sticks to the floor.

It’s Liam, the expert in Mesopotamian and Akkadian art who’s been coming to give Steve pointers for the last couple of weeks. Steve smiles, trying not to breathe like he’s just run a three minute mile. It must look as forced as it feels because Liam smirks and raises his eyebrows.

“You alright? I didn’t startle Captain America, did I?”

Steve snorts and bends over to start picking up the damn popsicle sticks. “It’ll take more than that.”

Liam sets his coffee cup on the workbench and squats down to help. “Yeah, of course. What was I thinking?”

Steve shakes his head but can’t quite manage a laugh, not with the goddamn angel looming over them. There’s also the ever waning illusion of his sanity to maintain, he thinks a bit hysterically, so Steve tries to remember how small talk works.

“So what brings you to my fair hovel?”

“Well, either it’s take my coffee break here or upstairs where Maurice glares at me the entire time for fucking around on my phone. What would you choose?”

“Fair enough,” Steve concedes. Maurice isn’t the most approachable of human beings and he manages to piss off virtually everyone he interacts with by virtue of his many strong opinions. Steve would take his coffee in the basement, too. If, you know, he weren’t already in the basement. Or if there wasn’t the perpetual presence of dread emanating from the statue he’s restoring.

“Your filched graveyard marker is coming along nicely.”

Steve looks up instantly. The angel’s face looks… like it always has. Grief-stricken but wistful. Stone. Human. _Bucky._

He’s definitely losing it.

“So you ever gonna put that wing back on?” Liam asks.

Steve blinks, abruptly reminded that there’s a visitor in his workspace. “Uh, yeah, I just got kinda over-focused on the other stuff.”

Liam laughs and nods. “Been there, done that. You want some help? I’ve got the next few days off.”

That is the last thing Steve needs. Steve needs an immediate mission that he can use to blame his sudden and extended absence while he figures out what the hell he’s going to do about this… whatever _this_ is. 

“Eh, I’ll get to it,” he hedges.

Liam laughs, and for once Steve resents Liam’s easy going nature. “Dude at this rate, you’ll get to it when you hit one fifty. I know for a fact you always come in on Friday mornings, unless you’re out Avenging or whatever the fuck propaganda name they call it. It’s my day off. I insist.”

Steve finds himself wishing that HYDRA were slightly, though not significantly, better at their job. Anything to get him out of this.

“Yeah, alright. I’ll text you if I can’t make it.”

Liam plucks the box of popsicle sticks from Steve’s hands and puts it on the table. “Fair enough. Now come show me what you’ve been doing.”

*****

After Steve personally calls Tony, Natasha, Clint, and Fury, it becomes glaringly obvious that no one has anything that they need help with. In theory, Steve could just lie. It would be the smart thing. Liam can’t fact-check him since most of his assignments are so classified they technically don’t exist, and honestly everyone at the museum just accepts his periodic disappearances as part and parcel. 

Still, lying has never really been his thing. He sits on his kitchen counter, staring at the coffee pot which has long since finished percolating, and contemplates his next move. 

It occurs to him — about fifteen minutes after he should have left — that begging off from work isn’t really _lying_ as much as it is a strategic delay. There have been plenty of times that he’s used deception on a mission, and no one ever said word one about it. Besides, Steve’s never been good at playing by the rules.

_Sorry for the late notice. Something came up at work. I can’t make it. -Steve_

As soon as he sends the text, relief washes over him. He’s been dreading going back to the museum ever since the statue snarled at him. First and foremost is the deep, primordial fear that the angel seems to invoke in Steve with just its presence. But beyond that, the situation is personally difficult, and not just because the statue looks so much like Bucky. If Steve fucks up this restoration, he’s not going to get a permanent position with the museum, and there’s every likelihood that his poor reputation will follow him should he try to get a job elsewhere. He’s spent four years trying to find a place for himself in the world, as just _Steve,_ and it’s his fucking luck that the first piece he gets assigned to restore is some possessed demon statue that gives him a serious case of the willies.

And Steve thought working for SHIELD was shitty.

*****

Like clockwork, or maybe just karma for claiming to have to work, Steve’s work phone begins ringing at the same time as his personal phone. As it turns out, he does in fact have to go in. 

When the dust clears, he’s been in briefings, re-briefings, and strategy meetings for three days; boots on the ground for another six days; in debriefs, doing paperwork, and pandering to the press corps for four more. By the time he actually unlocks the door to his apartment, all the food in his fridge has gone bad except the soy sauce. He calls a local delivery service because he’s dead on his feet and is ready to write up his resignation and email it to Fury. 

He flops on the sofa and mentally composes the letter. 

_To whom it may concern:_

_I hated the dancing monkey routine when I wore tights and I honestly don’t like it any better in full-body kevlar. I quit._

_Steve Rogers_

It’s an appealing, if entirely unrealistic endeavor, and he mentally rewrites the letter about six more times while he waits for his dinner to show up. Finally, his phone buzzes and he looks down, expecting a notification that his food is in-bound.

It’s Liam.

_Saw you had some words for that jackass from Fox. Twitter’s eating it up. Good job. See you at work tomorrow?_

Steve briefly considers throwing his phone out the window, but then he wouldn’t know when the delivery guy was waiting downstairs. Liam’s a good guy and Steve appreciates his easy company — none of the ogling or hero worship most people deem acceptable — but can’t a fella get fifteen goddamn minutes of peace? He sighs.

_Glad to know I got the tone right. See you in the morning. -Steve_

Not a full second after he hits send Steve realizes the error he’s made. Not once in the last nearly two weeks has Steve given any significant thought to what he’s going to do about the damn statue. And now, instead of buying himself a couple of days, which he easily could have done, he’s already reported in for work tomorrow. 

Shit.

*****

Liam’s waiting in the basement workroom when Steve finally musters up the courage to drag his ass into work. 

He raises his eyebrows at Steve and holds out a coffee. “You look like shit.”

“Long assignment,” Steve admits. And yeah, it fucking was. Two weeks is a helluva mission; usually he’s gone and back within three days. 

“Yeah, we noticed. Anyway, while you were gone I ordered the pins you’ll need to reattach the wing. Everything’s set up. I’ve got the day off and you’re not getting rid of me. Let’s patch this fucker up so you can get on to doing some real work.”

Steve appreciates Liam’s no-nonsense attitude. People tiptoe around him far too often, thinking he’s a saint or a blushing virgin or just anthropomorphized all-American home-baked apple pie. Sometimes he just wants to remind them that he was, in fact, in the Army and might not be the well-behaved little choir boy they seem to expect. 

“Yeah, alright,” he concedes. The statue looks just as mundane and Bucky-esque as ever. Two weeks out, it’s hard to remember the way those shifting eyes made fear creep into Steve’s body. It’s easier to dismiss the curled lips and pointed canines as a trick of the light on too little sleep. 

No one would claim that Steve’s in the best place, Steve least of all. The fear, the paranoia — maybe it really wasn’t about the statue at all. 

They get down to work, drilling holes, arranging the pins just so, mixing and applying glue, and then, finally, hoisting the wing into place. By the time they’re done, Steve feels, for the first time in weeks or maybe even months, like he’s really doing something that he loves. He and Liam are laughing and his concerns about weeping angels are all but put out of his head. 

Once the wing is secure, both of them step back to admire their work. It wasn’t easy, but Steve has to admit that it looks _good._ It helps that doing the work with Liam has substantially reduced that creeping feeling of somebody watching him. 

Maybe, Steve thinks, it’s because he knows that one of them always has eyes on it. 

But that’s craziness, because it’s _not_ a weeping angel. There’s no such thing. 

There’s _no such thing._

*****

They break for lunch and Liam declines Steve’s offer to buy. 

“Man, you know how cheap I am, but I’ve gotta go get my dry cleaning.”

Steve laughs. “You? Dry cleaning?”

Liam glares. “Hey, just because my clothes are off the rack from Target doesn’t mean I’m going to iron them myself. That’s why I use the dry cleaners.”

Steve holds out his hands in surrender. “Fair enough. See you at two?”

“See you at two,” Liam confirms.

*****

The problem is Steve _doesn’t_ see Liam at two. Or three. Or four. Liam’s also not answering his phone. Finally, Steve goes to talk to Leonard, the security guard. 

“Cap,” Leonard says with a nod.

“LT,” Steve returns. He’s learned that with some vets, it’s easier to stick with some degree of military address. It’s not a sign of anything other than respect — unlike with some of the civilians he encounters — and it’s nice to know when he’s around someone who understands what it means to serve.

“Have you seen Liam? We were working on a piece together but he never came back from lunch.”

Leonard’s eyebrows climb up to his hairline. “You sure about that? I saw him come back right before you.”

The dread he’d nearly forgotten wells up, covering him like a thick oil. He tries desperately to ignore every bullshit fairy tale he’s read about weeping angels. It can’t be that. It _can’t._

“Can you pull up the security footage?” Steve asks.

Leonard nods and turns the monitor towards Steve so he can see, too. Sure enough, there’s Liam stepping off the basement elevator at 1:54 PM. They watch together as Liam disappears down the corridor and out of sight of the cameras. Leonard fast forwards the feed but Liam doesn’t come out that way again. They check the loading bay camera. Nothing.

Leonard scowls at the screen. “And you’re sure he’s not down there?”

“Well, I mean I didn’t sweep the place, but he wasn’t in the workroom with me and he’s not answering his cell phone.”

Leonard picks up his radio and calls Lisa, the other security officer. “I got something I gotta check out, come take the front.”

*****

“Man, it’s like Fallujah all over again. I musta done fifty DAs a day. Except it’s air conditioned here and ain’t nobody tryna shoot my ass. But you know, basically the same thing.” 

Steve manages to huff something resembling a laugh, but he’s feeling far from amused. Unless Liam decided to pull a Clint up into an air duct, he’s definitely gone. The options for how that happened aren’t very numerous.

As they make their way down the hall towards the elevator, Steve _feels_ it. Every hair on the back of his neck stands up like he’s been hit with a stun gun. He spins fast enough to catch the door to his work room closing, though he can’t see who it was that opened it. He also can’t begin to imagine how they moved so fast.

When Steve half turns to Leonard, he’s already got his hand on his service pistol. “Not to be that guy,” Leonard says, “but you take point.”

Steve waves him off. “Stay here. I don’t think that gun is gonna do you a lot of good.”

“Give me the word and I’ll be right there,” Leonard says.

It’s not often that Steve lets non-combatants see him in all his enhanced glory, not unless he’s lapping them on his morning run in a retrospectively painful attempt to flirt, but Leonard wasn’t always a civilian. Steve’s down the hall in just under two seconds and he yanks the door open so fast the hydraulic arm on the other side snaps clean in half. 

The room is just like it was when they swept it half an hour ago — jumbled work benches and the angel standing under the lighting rig. 

But Steve’s pretty sure that’s the problem because the room may be the same, but it sure as hell ain’t empty. Not with that _thing_ in there.

*****

Steve’s not above admitting that he’s unsettled, maybe even scared. That _thing_ disappeared Liam without so much as a drop of blood. Given that Steve is still technically active military — his STRIKE team works with JSOC so it’s a loophole he’s happily exploiting — the museum can’t hold military related absences against him. For the first time since he’s been thawed, Steve volunteers for a mission. Anything to avoid going back to the museum.

*****

Two months of non-stop missions has Steve ready to go home. He’s a little miserable but the time has given him some space to think, and maybe also a little time to discreetly dig into classified servers about the whole weeping angel thing. To his great lack of surprise, Steve turned up exactly bupkis. In a way, it’s a relief. He’d rather deal with the possibility of slowly losing it than the idea that there are murderous angel statues lurking about. Still, Liam did just disappear into thin air and no one has seen hide nor hair of him. But as Nat pointed out, people disappear all the time. It doesn’t have to mean anything. 

And maybe it doesn’t mean anything, even if the people that Steve finally starts to like seem to systematically disappear from his life. He shakes himself out of that particular strain of self-pity and tosses his duffle bag on the floor. Two months and already everything is covered in dust. At least this time he had the foresight to empty the fridge before leaving.

*****

This time, Steve takes a few days to wind down before trying to go back to work. The museum, as always, is incredibly understanding. By the time Steve drags his ass in the employee entrance and chats with Leonard for a few minutes, he’s firmly set aside any of his previous concerns. The statue is just that, a statue. Soon, he’ll be done with it, and then he can get a real job with the museum. 

But resolution or no, dread begins to creep in around the edges as he makes his way deeper and deeper into the building. By the time he steps off the elevator, Steve’s got both hands balled into fists. 

The door to the work room has been repaired in his absence and it opens smoothly when Steve pulls the handle. Whatever he’s expecting, though, it isn’t there. The angel is just as he left it, not moved even so much as an inch.

_It’s just a stress reaction,_ he tells himself. Maybe going out for more active duty wasn’t the best choice, but hindsight is 20/20. Swallowing against the sudden dryness of his mouth, Steve picks up where he left off.

*****

Steve works well into the night, leaving only to convince people that he does indeed sleep like a normal person instead of three hours a night. The next morning he’s back again at 7:30. Leonard asks if the Army tortured the love of sleep out of Steve. Steve laughs and brushes it off, blaming his schedule on having just come off active duty. 

He endures Leonard’s morning teasing for another week of fifteen hour days before he’s ready to call the statue done. In reality, Steve _is_ getting pretty tired of practically living in the work room, but not because of the lack of sleep, though that’s becoming a problem. The feeling of being watched has gone from just during work hours to everywhere, all the time. Steve feels a creeping dread, not like he’s being watched but like he’s being _stalked._ His already sparse sleeping habits disintegrate, leaving him with patches of broken sleep and several nights where the panicked sensation of an interloper in his own home keeps him from doing anything more than tossing and turning. Steve’s only motivation to finish the statue is the promise of a respite from the constant fear.

*****

“Cap!” 

Steve fucking jumps three feet into the air and turns to face the intruder head on. It’s Leonard.

“You’re a little jumpy tonight,” Leonard observes congenially.

Steve sighs and nods. “Yeah, I guess so.”

“Probably your sign to be going home then. That and the fact that I’m kicking you out so I can set the alarm system. How’s it coming with that statue anyway?”

“I, uh, I think I’m done. I was just checking it again to make sure.”

Steve pulls out his phone and snaps a couple of photos from different angles. Then he attaches the files to an email to Ms. Maxwell, the director of art restoration.

“You gonna be here all night?” Leonard asks.

“Sorry. I was just sending off a confirmation that I’m done with the project. I’ll help you clear the rest of the building, come on,” Steve offers.

Leonard laughs. “Yeah, you owe me, making me wait on you down here in the dungeon with the ghost of Liam.”

Steve snorts, wishing that Leonard’s joke didn’t hadn’t hit so close to home, and follows him out the door. They make it halfway down the hall when they hear a loud bang coming from behind them. Steve swears it came from the restoration room and in the dim night-lighting he thinks he can see where the door is dented from an impact _inside_ the room.

Leonard pauses midstride, his hand already on his weapon. “What the hell was that?” 

Steve stops and looks back down the hallway, half expecting to see the angel right behind him. 

Nothing.

“I didn’t hear a damn thing,” Steve replies steadily. He prays to god that Leonard is either uninterested or can pick up on the “let’s not talk about this vibe.”

Leonard snorts and shakes his head. “God you’re a lazy bastard. Come on, let’s clear the archives.”

Steve laughs in relief and turns to follow Leonard to the elevator.

*****

In the morning there’s a few email alerts on his phone; when he checks they’re from Ms. Maxwell. 

_5:52am_  
Steven,  
I must say that these pictures show striking attention to detail. I will take a closer look at your work when I arrive in the morning, but I’ve already made my decision regarding your continuation at the museum and sent over the approval of your hiring to HR. They should be in contact with you soon. 

_Congratulations!!!!_

Steve smiles and relaxes into the mattress. He’s finally got something that’s his. For a moment, he entertains the possibility of tendering his resignation to SHIELD. It would be fantastic to be, if not entirely then mostly, done with fighting. But it’s also a decision he can’t make right now, so he opens Ms. Maxwell’s reply.

_8:31am_  
Steven,  
I’ve gone to the restoration room, but I cannot locate your statue. Our security officer Lisa and I checked the security footage last night. We’re unable to determine what’s occurred. Please contact me as soon as you receive this. 

Steve practically jumps out of bed. In under minute he’s dressed and vaulting down the stairs of his apartment building a flight at a time. He makes it to the museum by 9:30.

“Ms. Maxwell,” Steve says, poking his head into her office.

“Ah, yes, Steven. Did you get my message?”

Steve nods. “Yes, ma’am. You said it’s not there?”

She shakes her head and folds her hands together on the top of her desk. “Lisa and I checked the entire basement. We also reviewed the security footage. Can you walk me through last night?”

Steve tells her about his work, about Leonard and clearing the building. He tries to focus on the relevant, normal details. Not the details where he felt like something was coming to kill him, not the details where he thinks the statue was alive, and especially not the part where he thinks it took Liam. 

“Well, you’ve confirmed everything on the security footage, as well as Leonard’s account. I’m at a loss,” Ms. Maxwell admits.

Steve jams his hands in his pockets, hesitating before saying, “Do you think it has anything to do with Liam’s disappearance?”

Ms. Maxwell takes off her glasses and rubs the bridge of her nose. “You’re not the first person to suggest that, Steven. I, myself, have pondered the connection, but I’ve got no idea what to make of the disappearances.”

Steve nods. He has an idea, but it certainly isn’t anything he wants to share.

“Well, I must get back to this paperwork. If you see or hear anything, please do tell me. Oh, and Margerie in HR is expecting you. Once you’ve settled the paperwork, please go see Marcus. He’s got an assignment for you.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Steve answers up. “And thank you.”

“There’s no need to thank me, Steven. You did all of the work yourself.”

*****

_Two months later_

Steve’s not one to trade out phones like everyone else. If it works, it works. He doesn’t need to upgrade his personal phone every three months. But if he can’t get the damn camera to stop flashing every five minutes he’s going to put the damn thing through a wall and call it an accident. 

He unlocks the screen and checks to see which apps are open. Just like every other time this has happened it’s only the camera. He opens it with the intent of disabling the flash yet again, only to see a photo pulled up. 

It’s the angel statue. 

For a moment he could swear that his heart stops, but for the love of god it’s just a picture. He flicks the camera away and opens the gallery, scrolling down to the saved photos of the angel. Call it morbid curiosity, but Steve needs to see proof that he’s just having a moment of questionable sanity and nothing more.

But the photos that greet Steve are far from reassuring. The statue’s mouth is open wide, the lips twisted in a horrifying grin showing teeth that are long and pointed. But the horrifying aspects of the angel aside, it still looks like Bucky. Steve’s not sure what to make of it. 

He remembers all the things he read online, all the stories of weeping angels stalking their victims. A cold fear washes over him.

Steve sets the phone down on the workbench. It flashes again. He unlocks it and a close up of the angel’s face stares back at him, its teeth bared.

Quickly, Steve crushes the phone with his hand and tosses it in a tub of used muriatic acid. The waste disposal guys probably won’t appreciate finding his phone in there, but at the moment he just can’t be fucked to care.

Shit. 

Shit. Shit. Shit.


End file.
